On Wednesday, I headed off to the TEA party protest in front of the Richardson City Hall.  It was not the organized and scripted affair that I experienced at the first event I attended in down town Dallas.  When I arrived, I found a good sized crowd of people standing along the sidewalk with signs and flags.  Someone handed me a flag.  I had no sign, so I held up the flag.

I had to ask myself what we were accomplishing.  At one point, unfortunately after the crowd had thinned a little, a news helecopter showed up and hovered around for a while.  I didn’t get a chance that night to watch for any evidence on the news of our particular demonstration.  I was there in hopes of making some local connections, but I kept thinking how much more powerful it would have been if all the suburbs had congregated at the down town rally and made for some really big numbers. 

I lack the social skills to initiate conversations with people I don’t know, so in the end the only thing I walked home with was a cheap flag I really didn’t know what to do with.  We have a nicer one we put out on occasion.  This one is now flying from the handle of the old portable CD player in my office.  I’m still glad to have been among those who came out and made their feelings known.  I’ll probably do it again in future, but there’s so much more we need to do, and most of it more productive than standing on the side of the street holding a sign.